GOLD Coast skipper Scott Prince wants his team to go for the jugular against Penrith today with the Titans fearing soft tries could cost them a finals dream.

The Titans need successive wins over Penrith and Manly to be any chance at reaching the finals, but even then their minus six points differential could leave them stranded outside the top eight.

Given the Gold Coast have conceded last tries in wins over Parramatta and Canberra, Prince has demanded his team adopt a ruthless mentality to today's danger game at Centrebet Stadium.

"It's a bit of a danger game. We're playing against a team that has nothing to lose and playing carefree type football," he said. "It's important for us to keep the foot on the throat, so to speak, and be ruthless in everything we do.

"It's a game that's quite easy to get up for, when you have to win to keep our dreams alive in regards to semi-final football. The guys have prepared well this week, so no excuses, no regrets."

Defensively it is hard to fault the Titans. They are the No.1 team in the NRL for conceding the fewest points in the first half of games and rank highly for overall points conceded since they clicked into gear after the 10th round.

Coach John Cartwright admitted late tries had been an issue, but of more concern is improving their completion rate with the ball to ensure they don't put unnecessary strain on their defensive line.

Greg Bird and John CartwrightSource:The Daily Telegraph

"It was disappointing last week, I will grant you that, but we have been the best defensive side in the first half all year and the last 10 weeks we're up in the top two or three clubs defensively," he said. "It's nice to have that sort of problem if you're worried about when you're leaking points. (Completion rate) bugged us all year.

"We have a lot of guys that want to play a bit of footy. There's no excuses for it, we just have to know when the pass is on and when it's not.

"If we keep it up around 80 per cent figure we tend to win most of our games."

Cartwright had been concerned his side was mentally fatigued last week and said the feeling is no different today as they continue to skate on thin ice to the finals.

"Mentally we've been on a knife's edge for a long time," he said. "Every win has been gold and every loss people predict that might be the loss that does it.

"Mentally that takes its toll. But the finish line is in sight now. "Who knows, after the weekend if we win tomorrow we could be sitting in eighth place and destiny is in our own hands. "There is still another weekend and I reckon there's still some twists and turns that are going to happen."

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